CFL Week 14/15/16 Retrospective - Bad Blogger
Its crunch time in this wild 2009 CFL season and someone has fallen a little bit behind as of late. Below are the scores from Weeks 14, 15 and 16 followed by the Section 39 View for from three exciting weeks of CFL action.
Week 14
Edmonton 17 at Winnipeg 27
Saskatchewan 16 at British Columbia 19
Montreal 27 at Toronto 8
Hamilton 14 at Calgary 15
Week 15
British Columbia 34 at Edmonton 31
Toronto 22 at Saskatchewan 32
Calgary 11 at Montreal 32
Winnipeg 38 at Hamilton 28
Week 16
Edmonton 22 at Toronto 19
Saskatchewan 44 at Calgary 44
Hamilton 38 at Montreal 41
British Columbia 24 at Winnipeg 21
The View Ffrom Section 39:
Have to start with the game of the year, Week 16's Saskatchewan - Calgary tilt that ended in a 44-44 overtime classic. This game had it all. Lots of scoring, big plays, controversial calls, overtime, a big crowd. The people in attendance at McMahon Stadium in Calgary sure got their money's worth.
Big surprise, seeing as though I am a Rider fan, but count me in on the side that thinks the call against John Chick in overtime of the Rider-Stamps game was a CHEAP call. That play kind of reminded me of the penalty the Baltimore Ravens took against New England's Tom Brady in the NFL a few weeks back.
To paraphrase NBC's Rodney Harrison...put some pants on Henry.
Funniest moment of the Rider-Stamps classic was the reaction of Calgary Head Coach, John Hufnagel, after his team was penalized for trying to call time out in OT (which extended a Rider drive). You could see in the replay that Hufnagel was yelling, "don't call time out!" to his players on the field and when someone did, he exploded. I believe the culprit was Linebacker Dwaine Carpenter and Huffer looked as though he was about to go all Hannibal Lecter and eat Carpenter's liver with some fava beans and a nice bottle of Chianti after the game. Not sure why, but those Stampeder players have had trouble with the rules of Canadian Football the past number of years.
Chris Cuthbert just may be the best play by play man in all of Canada right now. I have to admit that I don't see to much of his hockey work any more but he has always been first rate in every broadcast, NHL or CFL, that I have watched. Cuthbert also has a quick wit as evidenced by his shot at colour man, Glen Suitor, during Week 14's Rider-BC game. After Rider punter Jamie Boreham delivered a hellacious hit on BC punt returner Ryan Grice-Mullen a lot of talk, and video replays, on the TSN broadcast followed. After Cuthbert commented that Boreham must have been spending some extra time in the weight room, Suitor reminded the audience that Boreham played Saftey in his CIS football days. In response, Cuthbert, with mock incredulity, shouted "SAFETIES CAN HIT?!?!?!" at his broadcast partner, and former Safety, Suitor. Very funny stuff.
The Montreal Alouettes just keep rolling along. 13 and 2 with first place all locked up. What can you say about the Als other than that they are the class of the CFL right now.
Don't look now but the BC Lions are lurking in the hunt for first place in the West. The Leos are within striking distance of Calgary and Saskatchewan for first place, sitting one point behind the front runners. BC plays the Riders and Stamps over the next two weeks and they definitely have a shot to sneak in to first after their terrible start. The only question for the Lions is will any of the QBs still be standing when all is said and done?
Although they lost to the Lions today, the Winnipeg Blue Bombers have also been hot of late as they have moved into a tie for second place with the reeling Hamilton Tiger-Cats. Michael Bishop has been the spark to lead Winnipeg back into the hunt but if I am a Winnipeg fan I know that "Bish" will implode at some point. The only question is will it happen in the play-off or will it cost the Blue Bombers a play-off spot.
Speaking of Hamilton, the Tiger-Cats have almost been Argo like over the past 6 weeks. Hamilton doesn't seem to be able to buy a win these days and they just seem to be finding ways to lose. A classic example was Week 14's loss in Calgary. The Ti-Cats played the chess game well getting the ball in Calgary territory with time to kick the winning field goal to ice the game. Only the Cat offense forgot which was they were supposed to be going and in consecutive plays actually lost field position and the opportunity to kick the winning points.
Its hard to figure the Edmonton Eskimos out right now. The Esks offense looked unstoppable in Week 12 against Saskatchewan but has not really been good since. The Esks defense has been kind of shaky all year. It has all added up to a bit of a slide by the Grey Cup Champions of February. Fortunately for Edmonton they just came off the closest thing to a bye week in the CFL, a game against the Toronto Argonauts, and they have another in Week 18 to keep them in the West Division chase.
What can you say about the Toronto Argonauts right now? This team is terrible and there is plenty of blame to be passed around. In my opinion, once the ownership situation is settled, a house cleaning is in order. First on the chopping block should be General Manager Adam Rita and his side-kick Greg Mohns. Say what you will about Head-Coach Bart Andrus but maybe if he had some talent on the playing field, things just might be a little bit different. Andrus may be a casualty in a purge as well, since it appears that he is seriously over in over his head in the Canadian game. However, in time Andrus could catch up and be a decent CFL head coach, especially if he had some experienced assistant coaches.
